Name
by Rose—Age 54—Los Angeles, CA
Eons ago, someone named Matteo picked out a woman near one of the seven hills of what later became Rome and started a family by becoming a First Father, kind of like Adam and Eve. His many boys and girls all belonged to Matteo—until the girls married. Boys, you keep. Anyway, just as it is in the Bible, Matteo had only a first name—like Moses or Noah. “Who’s that?” somebody might ask, and the answer would be, “Oh, that’s Lucia who belongs to Matteo.” From there, as more and more people were born and raised families that belonged to Matteo, words like “that’s” and “who” got dropped and it became “Lucia belongs to Matteo”, or Lucia Di Matteo. That simple. For Americans, “Di” means “of” or, well, you get it. You had to behave—never shame the name of your people.
By the time all this family-making got to me, around mid-20th century, my parents lived near Lake Ontario, New York State, United States of America, way across the ocean and then some from Rome. No other Di Matteos around, only my dad, his brother, and their parents. What a lonely thing that must have been. In Italy, I bet there would be Di Matteos all over the place, but I’ve never been there so I don’t know. Thank God that before long, my parents made sure there were five more Di Matteos, and my uncle (who married a saint) added another fourteen. Unfortunately my uncle broke my grandpa’s heart by doing all that family-making across the country in California, so actually, we—my dad’s family—were it. Every Sunday, we all had dinner together, then Dad and Grandpa watched The News with Walter Cronkite brought to you by Prudential Insurance and the Rock of Gibraltar. The living room air was so full of cigarette smoke for us to enjoy second hand that by the time I was thirteen, I was all ready to smoke my own. Like most people, I’ve been trying to quit ever since.
Today I live in California with my son, at least for now. No big thing. His name is Taylor—must be at least a bazillion Taylors all over America . And he might be having too much fun to make a family, I don’t know. Things have changed, that’s for sure.
2 Comments